156 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



mer, besides taking twenty to thirty lawyers at each haul of the net. 

 At rare intervals a sturgeon is obtained. Three or 4 tons of eel-pouts 

 are annually sold to the Polish portion of the population of Milwaukee. 



A few herring-nets, about half the length of the nets used on the 

 steamers, are owned by the seine and set-line fishermen. Two of them 

 are fished by each crew. Old herring-nets that have been made over 

 are used in small quantities by the sucker fishermen, in the open lake 

 in spring and under the ice in winter. The same men devote their at- 

 tention to minnow-seining and perch-hooking during the summer. 



Set-line or tratvl fishery. — This method was introduced from She- 

 boygau in 1874, and large catches are reported to have been made at 

 the very beginning of the fishery. Since that time, set-line fishing has' 

 been carried on regularly during the summer. Each of the gill-net 

 steamers now carries three or four gangs of two hundred to five hun- 

 dred hooks each, placed 6 feet apart on the line which is sustained by 

 cedar floats at intervals of 10 fathoms. Some of the steamers employ 

 trawls throughout the year, while others use them only from May to 

 September, and still others confine their fishing to the months of June 

 and July. 



The lines are set northeast and east of the reef already mentioned, in 

 25 to 50 fathoms of water, and are left in place from one to three nights 

 before being visited. Two gangs are always in the water together^ and 

 the others on board the vessel. At the beginning of the fishery the 

 hooks were set on the bottom, but failing for three or four successive 

 years to take many fish in that way, the fishermen began the use of long 

 snoods in attaching the hooks to the trawl-line. In 1884 experiments 

 were made in setting the hooks near the surface. The result was not 

 satisfactory, but in the following season the captain of the steamer O. 

 R. Green, who had been accustomed to fish surface set-lines for salmon 

 in the Baltic Sea, made a new trial which was so successful that the 

 method was at once adopted by the crews of all the steamers. Herring 

 are used for bait in this fishery. The hook is run through the jaws of 

 the fish, two half-hitches are taken around its tail, and it is then blown 

 up through the mouth so that it will float when in the water and re- 

 semble a live fish. Trout is the only species thus caught. 



Another set-line fishery is carried on along the beacb, for perch and 

 lawyers, by the two dozen men who also use the minnow-seines and 

 crayfish-baskets. The lines are provided with eight hundred or one 

 thousand hooks, and minnows are used for bait. The products of this 

 fishery are sold locally in a fresh condition. The business began about 

 1877 and has been steadily increasing in extent and importance. It is 

 now followed throughout the entire year except in winter. 



Haul-seine fishery. — Prior to 1860 large seines were fished regu- 

 larly in Milwaukee and big hauls were made. Since then the little 

 fishing of this sort that has existed has been with very small seines 

 operated in connection with other kinds of apparatus. From 18G0 up 

 to 1880 there were only three or four seines used in the city, but in 1885 



